Re That's how power from NE India is going to be sold (Dilip Deka) You will find the Press Release of ABB Group on this topic at http://www.abb.com/cawp/seitp202/e4f3fead1db220636525796e00255d2f.aspx ABB Group books Rs. 4000 crores UHVDC power transmission order in India.( 2011-12-23). It seems power will be generated in the NE. But it will be consumed somewhere else. Prolonged load shedding will continue. Wahid
-----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of [email protected] Sent: 29 December 2011 07:30 To: [email protected] Subject: assam Digest, Vol 77, Issue 27 Send assam mailing list submissions to [email protected] To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit http://assamnet.org/mailman/listinfo/assam_assamnet.org or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to [email protected] You can reach the person managing the list at [email protected] When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific than "Re: Contents of assam digest..." Today's Topics: 1. Re: [assam] China first to win oil-hunt rights in the scramble for Afghanistan ([email protected]) 2. That's how power from NE India is going to be sold (Dilip Deka) 3. Bhal Manuh :: 1st Episode - Uttam Teron (Buljit Buragohain) 4. Bhal Manuh : 2nd Episode - Biju Borbarua . (Buljit Buragohain) 5. Does it have to be either here or there? Why not both places? (Dilip Deka) 6. Bogibeel bridge (Manoj Das) 7. Musician bats for study on folk music (Nava Thakuria) 8. Re: Musician bats for study on folk music (Manoj Das) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Message: 1 Date: Wed, 28 Dec 2011 04:44:55 -0500 (EST) From: [email protected] To: [email protected] Cc: [email protected] Subject: Re: [Assam] [assam] China first to win oil-hunt rights in the scramble for Afghanistan Message-ID: <[email protected]> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"; format=flowed Dear Friends: What an interesting news! Read it straight from today's Independent (28 12 201) -bhuban The war may be raging still, but the scramble for Afghanistan has already begun, and China is emerging at the head of the pack after it became the first foreign state to win the right to hunt for oil in the country. The state-owned National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) will sign a deal with Afghanistan's Ministry of Mines today, which will allow the Chinese firm to work oil blocks in the north-eastern provinces of Sari Pul and Faryab. The deal will give China access to the Amu Darya River Basin, which is said to contain reserves of about 87 million barrels of oil, a statement from the president's office in Kabul said yesterday. "This is the first big contract for exploration and extraction of oil in Afghanistan," the statement said. Afghanistan is landlocked and needs to import its fuel from neighbouring Iran and from central Asian countries. While this deal is relatively small, it sends a signal that Beijing is first in line for the potentially lucrative reserves that are yet to be drilled. China's rapidly expanding economy relies heavily on natural resources from abroad to keep going, and China has signed deals in some of the world's toughest markets to ensure its energy supply continues without a hitch. This has seen China sign deals with governments that the West sees as pariah states. China already has the biggest single foreign investment in Afghanistan ? three years ago the China Metallurgical Construction Coorporation signed a ?2.2bn contract to develop the Aynak copper mine in Logar province. Afghanistan is still seen as a good way off being stable enough to lure the mainstream international investor. However, Sari Pul and Faryab are many hundreds of miles away from the main conflict hotspots and are considered reasonably safe. The US-led Nato force has already transferred or is turning over responsibility for security in large parts of the region to the Afghan army and police. Minister Wahidullah Shahrani will sign the accord with the director of the Beijing-based company, and the contract calls for CNPC to form a joint venture with a local partner, the Watan Group. Some 70 per cent of the profits from the joint-venture operation will be paid to the government. The Soviets identified vast mineral resources in Afghanistan in the 1970s, including oil, copper and iron. However, roads and other infrastructure were underdeveloped to begin with and what was there has been badly damaged during decades of conflict, keeping Western miners at bay. For China, the deal marks a first step in a country that could ultimately prove very profitable indeed. And for Chinese firms, poor infrastructure is as much of an opportunity as it is a challenge. All over Africa, Chinese firms are building roads and hospitals and schools and football stadiums, both to cement soft power in resource-rich African countries and also to build the infrastructure needed to move the resources out and back to China. As well as significant expertise in building roads in developing countries, Chinese firms also build airports and other transport hubs, and are keen to sell the country's high-speed rail technology overseas. ------------------------------ Message: 2 Date: Wed, 28 Dec 2011 05:42:11 -0800 (PST) From: Dilip Deka <[email protected]> To: ASSAMNET <[email protected]> Subject: [Assam] That's how power from NE India is going to be sold Message-ID: <[email protected]> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 ABB books $900m power transmission order in Indiaby?Daniel Canty on Dec 27, 2011 ? ? addthis_pub = 'itpservices'; ? An ABB transformer. ABB has booked an order worth more than $900 million from Power Grid Corporation of India Ltd., to deliver an ultrahigh-voltage direct current (UHVDC) transmission system. The link will supply hydropower from mountainous northeast India to the populous region of Agra in central India, 1,700 kilometers away. Northeast India has abundant hydropower resources scattered over a large area, while the load centers are often located thousands of kilometers away. India plans to create pooling points in the region to collect electricity generated from several hydropower stations and transport it across power superhighways to major urban load centers. The UHVDC link, operating at 800 kilovolts (kV) will have a converter capacity of 8,000 megawatts (MW), the highest ever built. When operating at full capacity, it will have the means to supply electricity to 90 million people based on current figures for average national consumption. The system will be the world?s first multi-terminal ultrahigh-voltage link and will have three converter stations. Two ?sending? stations will convert power from alternating current (AC) to DC for transmission over a single power line and deliver electricity to a third, ?receiving? station in Agra where it will be converted back into AC for distribution to end users. The power link will pass through the so called "chicken neck area"; a very narrow patch of land (22 km wide x 18 km long) in the state of West Bengal, which borders Nepal and Bangladesh. Using ultrahigh-voltage transmission, helps to minimize losses and improve efficiency. The deployment of a multi-terminal solution as compared to running separate power links, brings considerable cost reductions. ------------------------------ Message: 3 Date: Wed, 28 Dec 2011 22:06:52 +0530 (IST) From: Buljit Buragohain <[email protected]> To: "[email protected]" <[email protected]>, "[email protected]" <[email protected]>, "[email protected]" <[email protected]>, "[email protected]" <[email protected]>, "[email protected]" <[email protected]>, "[email protected]" <[email protected]> Cc: "\"uttam teron\"" <[email protected]> Subject: [Assam] Bhal Manuh :: 1st Episode - Uttam Teron Message-ID: <[email protected]> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 Bhal Manuh :: 1st Episode - Uttam Teron http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VTSYqQeUJNg ..................................................... Uttam Teron is making education appealing for children of a community that has traditionally seen a very high drop-out rate. Parijat Academy, founded by Uttam, at Pamohi, near Guwahati, started off by attracting children of stone-crushers and daily wage-earners that dropped out of formal schooling. So successful was this venture--and such did his credibility among the locals grow--that people started preferring Parijat Academy to Government schools for starting the schooling of their children. Uttam's second achievement is that he has managed to fund this entire venture by drawing on the support of the global Non-Resident Assamese (NRA) community. And all this, using the networking power of the internet. ------------------------------ Message: 4 Date: Wed, 28 Dec 2011 22:11:01 +0530 (IST) From: Buljit Buragohain <[email protected]> To: "[email protected]" <[email protected]>, "[email protected]" <[email protected]>, "[email protected]" <[email protected]>, "[email protected]" <[email protected]>, "[email protected]" <[email protected]>, "[email protected]" <[email protected]> Cc: "\"Biju Borbaruah\"" <[email protected]> Subject: [Assam] Bhal Manuh : 2nd Episode - Biju Borbarua . Message-ID: <[email protected]> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 ?Bhal Manuh :? 2nd Episode - Biju Borbarua http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_VTncAYNv5w ....................................... Biju Borbarua, through her organisation Asha Darshan, is working to bring about a comprehensive socio-economic transformation in the Tamulpur region of Baksa district, along the Indo-Bhutan border. Her work is in the areas of (a) education (b) microfinance and (c) women empowerment. She runs schools, provides capital to start small-businesses, and organises women to resist domestic violence. While this may seem fairly routine, what makes Biju's work stand out is her choice of territory. The Tamulpur region along the Indo-Bhutan border is greatly under-developed and hugely insurgency-prone. The Government has done little to develop education, health, road and law-enforcement infrastructure. In such a hostile environment, it is remarkable that a single woman chose to live, work and prosper within the local community. ------------------------------ Message: 5 Date: Wed, 28 Dec 2011 11:57:07 -0800 (PST) From: Dilip Deka <[email protected]> To: ASSAMNET <[email protected]> Subject: [Assam] Does it have to be either here or there? Why not both places? Message-ID: <[email protected]> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 I really believe he is looking for concessions from the government/s to invest in India. In the business world, there is nothing wrong with that. My only comment is it would be "transparent" (that he seems to like) if he said it openly. Also, if he wants to invest in USA or Europe, there is nothing stopping him. Tatas and Mittals have done that already. ============================================================================ === India tycoon's got tons of cash, nowhere to invest Indian billionaire with $3.8 billion pile of cash can't find worthy domestic investmentBy Erika Kinetz, AP Business Writer | AP???Tue, Dec 27, 2011 10:12 AM EST ? Related Content * In this Monday, Dec. 19, 2011 photo, billionaire Indian tycoon Ajay Piramal speaks during an interview with the Associated Press at his office in Mumbai, India. In May last year, Piramal's healthcare business sold its generic drug operations to U.S. pharmaceutical giant Abbott Laboratories for $3.8 billion. Piramal was eager to set that cash pile to work and wanted to expand one of his chemical plants, but was told it would take five years. With the country mired in corruption, bureaucratic red tape and unclear and changing government policies, many of the men who made their billions here are saying maybe it's time to quit India. It's got to be easier to do business elsewhere. (AP Photo/Rafiq Maqbool) MUMBAI, India (AP) -- Ajay Piramal is sitting on a mountain of cash. Yet the billionaire Indian tycoon, working in one of the world's fastest growing economies, is struggling to figure out what to do with the money. The problem isn't opportunity, he said. It's India. "Every large investment, there was no transparency," Piramal said. His dilemma is a worrying sign for India. With the country mired in corruption, bureaucratic red tape and unclear and changing government policies, many of the men who made their billions here are saying maybe it's time to quit India. It's got to be easier to do business elsewhere. In May last year, Piramal's healthcare business sold its generic drug operations to U.S. pharmaceutical giant Abbott Laboratories for $3.8 billion. Piramal, a tall big man in a country that still measures prosperity by girth, was eager to set that cash pile to work. He wanted to expand one of his chemical plants, but was told it would take five years. "The same plant could be set up in China in two years," he said. "I love India, but my customer is not going to wait." India, still a beacon of relatively fast growth despite a troubled world economy, should be a magnet for capital. Instead, since the beginning of 2010, the amount that Indians have invested in businesses overseas has exceeded the amount foreigners are investing in India, according to central bank figures. In part this reflects the confidence and aptitude of India's maturing companies and the current malaise in the global economy and financial markets. But it also reflects deep problems at home. India's big coporations may be cash rich but the failure to invest that money domestically is bad news for a developing country that needs capital to build the roads, power plants and food warehouses that could help lift hundreds of millions out of dire poverty. The frustration of India's business elite with corruption, political paralysis, log-jammed approvals, regulatory flip-flops, lack of access to natural resources and land acquisition battles ? to pick a few of the top complaints ? has reached a pitch perhaps not heard since India began liberalizing its economy in the early 1990s. "If you are an honest businessman in India, it's very difficult to start up anything," said Jamshyd Godrej, chairman of manufacturing giant Godrej & Boyce. "Companies are going to operate where they see the best opportunities and efficiency for their capital." Increasingly, that's outside India. In 2008, foreigners poured roughly twice as much direct investment into India ? $33 billion ? as Indians plowed into businesses overseas. By 2010, that had reversed: Indians invested $40 billion abroad ? twice as much as foreigners invested in India ? a trend that's continued this year. There is another, unspoken element to all the complaints. To the extent that business in India ran on corruption, some of the old, dirty ways of doing things are being disrupted, freezing India's already glacial bureaucracy, business leaders say. Scandals in the staging of the Commonwealth Games, the pilfering of homes meant for war widows and the irregular auction of cellphone spectrum that cost the country billions has sent parliamentarians and even a Cabinet minister to prison. With Indians tiring of the incessant graft, tens of thousands of middle-class protesters poured into the streets and pushed an anti-corruption bill onto the floor of Parliament. Steelmakers can't get enough iron ore because a massive mining scandal in the southern state of Karnataka prompted a court to order the closure of illicit mines that account for a fifth of iron ore production in the country. The bureaucrats ? even the honest ones ? are reportedly so scared of being punished they are refusing to make the decisions needed to make the country run. Piramal is not unpatriotic. Each room in his executive suite is named after an Indian epic hero: Arjuna, the most pure; Dhananjay, acquirer and master of wealth. There's a quote from the Upanishads scriptures on the wall. His office sits in a one million square foot office park in Mumbai his family built. The buildings around him ? white with blue glass that flashes back the unforgiving sun ? bear his own name in large black letters: Piramal Towers. Piramal had the will and the means to build power plants and roads. Instead, his Piramal Group's largest investment to date has been in one of the office park's tenants: the Indian subsidiary of the British telecom giant Vodafone Plc. Last September, when he got the first payout, of $2.2 billion, from Abbott, the phone started ringing. "Because people knew we had money, we had so many people approaching us for projects in the infrastructure sector," he said. "These people had no experience and no knowledge and no track record of having built a business in any area. And yet they were coming to us saying we have licenses and approvals. That just didn't sound right or smell right." Each day, they paraded through his office: The investment banker who decided to build a 500 megawatt power plant, the coal trader assured of a government coal allocation, small-time miners with pretty presentations promising land, licenses and financing. "They'd name politicians from the center and the state who had it all tied up for them," he said. "It didn't sound right. Obviously there were things going on in the system." Road and port projects weren't much better, he said. Piramal also looked at investing in engineering and infrastructure services companies, but couldn't make sense of their books. "We couldn't find anything," he said. "People get greedy. In their desire to get good valuations they resort to, if I can say, creative accounting." Today, India's infrastructure companies are known as great wealth destroyers. "Infrastructure investment has become untouchable, a sure way of losing money," said Jagannadham Thunuguntla, head of research at SMC Global Securities. He calculates that four of India's top infrastructure companies ? GMR Infrastructure, GVK Power and Infrastructure, Lanco Infratech and Punj Lloyd ? have lost over 80 percent of their value since 2007. A fifth, Larson & Toubro is down 50 percent. Piramal may have dodged a bullet, but shareholders in Piramal Healthcare aren't happy. Despite a $600 million special dividend and share buyback, the share price has sagged since the Abbott deal was announced on May 21 last year. They'd like to see the Abbott cash productively deployed. Instead, much of it is sitting in fixed deposit accounts. Piramal said he really does want to run a pharmaceutical company and be the first Indian company to discover a world-class drug ? despite his dabbling in telecom, financial services and real estate financing. It's just that pharma can't absorb all his cash. He plans to sell the 5.5 percent stake he picked up in Vodafone Essar for $640 million in a few years, when Vodafone Essar issues shares in an initial public offering, he said. He has also launched Piramal Capital, to make real estate and infrastructure loans, and spent about $50 million to acquire IndiaReit, a real estate investment company. Meanwhile, his thoughts have turned to Boston, where he set up IndUS Growth Partners with a professor from Harvard Business School to look for buying opportunities in the U.S., in security, financial services and biotechnology. And he said he's still planning to spend over a billion dollars on biotechnology acquisitions in North America and Europe. "India was going more towards capitalism than socialism," Piramal said. "I think we're going back. Capitalism went to too much excess. Corruption levels went to the extreme." He said he'll announce his first overseas acquisition by March. ------------------------------ Message: 6 Date: Thu, 29 Dec 2011 10:28:55 +0530 From: Manoj Das <[email protected]> To: A Mailing list for people interested in Assam from around the world <[email protected]> Subject: [Assam] Bogibeel bridge Message-ID: <cakbdbrnuugqjyj+n_btt7ghalfjqpebfybe+-4vgynnglb-...@mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 Superstructure *works on* Bogibeel bridge soon Ron Duarah DIBRUGARH, Dec 28 ? Work on the Rs 987 crore Bogibeel bridge superstructure is all set to commence, with a *joint venture group* led by Hindustan *Construction Company* (HCC) bagging *the work* order from the Railway Board after almost a year?s delay. The HCC-led *joint venture* has two other partner firms in the work: DSD Brouckenbau GmBH of Germany and another Indian firm, VNR Infrastructures Limited. HCC is one of the leading engineering firms of the country. Among others, the company is associated with the Delhi Metro, the Worli Sea Link in Mumbai and several express highway projects in the country and abroad. Today, the deputy chief engineer in charge of the Bogibeel superstructure works, Mohinder Singh has taken charge of office at the Bogibeel Project Office here. He said he is keen to see the time bound completion of the bridge, so that the public could avail vastly improved transport facilities across both banks of the Brahmaputra here. The Bogibeel bridge here would have a length of 4.315 kms. A rail-cum-road bridge, the structure would have double BG railway lines on the lower deck and a three lane highway on the upper deck. With work progressing on the gauge conversion on the Rangiya-Murkongselek section on the north bank of the river, railway infrastructure is set for vast improvement in the State in *the next* four years. Railway sources said they are keen to extend the Murkong Selek line upto Pasighat. ------------------------------ Message: 7 Date: Wed, 28 Dec 2011 21:23:37 -0800 (PST) From: Nava Thakuria <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Cc: [email protected], [email protected] Subject: [Assam] Musician bats for study on folk music Message-ID: <[email protected]> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Musician bats for study on folk music GUWAHATI: Nikhilesh Barua, a veteran Goalparia folk musician of the state, on Tuesday urged the Asom Sahitya Sabha and the state government to take immediate steps to conduct a scientific study on the folk music of Goalpara district. http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/guwahati/Musician-bats-for-study-on- folk-music/articleshow/11275464.cms ------------------------------ Message: 8 Date: Thu, 29 Dec 2011 10:55:44 +0530 From: Manoj Das <[email protected]> To: A Mailing list for people interested in Assam from around the world <[email protected]> Subject: Re: [Assam] Musician bats for study on folk music Message-ID: <cakbdbrp7xx6nsmnjxggpgxuj1gc21nz4y04u14nynpr-tyk...@mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 hello Mr Thakuria...kene ase On Thu, Dec 29, 2011 at 10:53 AM, Nava Thakuria <[email protected]>wrote: > Musician bats for study on folk music > > GUWAHATI: Nikhilesh Barua, a veteran Goalparia folk musician of the state, > on Tuesday urged the Asom Sahitya Sabha and the state government to take > immediate steps to conduct a scientific study on the folk music of Goalpara > district. > > > > http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/guwahati/Musician-bats-for-study-on- folk-music/articleshow/11275464.cms > > _______________________________________________ > assam mailing list > [email protected] > http://assamnet.org/mailman/listinfo/assam_assamnet.org > ------------------------------ _______________________________________________ assam mailing list [email protected] http://assamnet.org/mailman/listinfo/assam_assamnet.org End of assam Digest, Vol 77, Issue 27 ************************************* _______________________________________________ assam mailing list [email protected] http://assamnet.org/mailman/listinfo/assam_assamnet.org
